Comment by nmadden
1 day ago
> The pads are split into three pieces that are XORed to create the actual pad to reduce risk of compromise.
Thus creating a two-time pad, which is completely insecure…
1 day ago
> The pads are split into three pieces that are XORed to create the actual pad to reduce risk of compromise.
Thus creating a two-time pad, which is completely insecure…
No, the idea is that the actual key is the XOR of 3 completely independent keys. I think you were thinking of XORing a key with itself 3 times, which would just return the original key.
In the book, there is a cargo ship carrying 1/3 of a OTP. Other two other ships from two other companies are carrying the other thirds. This actually is a fairly decent method of transporting a OTP (I'm assuming there's some kind of physical security preventing tampering).
The book even talks later on about how only using the pad isn't enough, since it provides no proof of authorship or tampering. Vinge did a pretty good job w/compsci in the book.